Jay Leno was one of the most successful hosts in the history of late-night TV.
But there’s one thing that he refused to do during his peak.
And Jay Leno revealed one secret about his career that took Hollywood by surprise.
Jay Leno turned down hosting the Oscars twice
The Academy Awards are the biggest show of awards season in Hollywood.
At one time, the awards show that highlighted the best movies of the year was a major ratings draw.
But the ratings for the Oscars have dropped over the years as Hollywood has become increasingly out of touch with the rest of the country.
Hosting duties have typically gone to a comedian who roasts the stars throughout the ceremony.
Former Tonight Show host Jay Leno never hosted the Academy Awards, but revealed that he was offered the gig twice.
“I did get asked twice,” Leno recalled. “And I sat down with my staff and said, ‘What do we do? We have to do a show the day before the Oscars. We have to do a show the day after the Oscars. Do we save our best jokes for our show? Or do we give all of our best jokes to the Oscar show?’”
Leno’s temporary replacement on The Tonight Show, Conan O’Brien, is hosting the Oscars for the first time this year.
“And we realized that when you see somebody on TV every night, it’s not special to see them hosting the Oscars,” Leno explained. “That’s my feeling. You’re on TV too much. I think Conan will be good because he’s not on every night like he used to be . . . I think he’ll do fine.”
O’Brien became a podcaster after his TBS late-night talk show Conan concluded in 2021.
Leno revealed that his predecessor at The Tonight Show, the legendary Johnny Carson, gave him some advice about the Oscars after hosting them five times.
“I asked Johnny, and he said, ‘You’re either too funny or you’re not funny enough.’ That was a criticism,” Leno stated. “This is the industry and now you’re here making fun of it. Johnny really felt it was a no-win situation.”
Jay Leno admits he got out of TV at the right time
Late-night talk shows have been a downhill slide since President Donald Trump came onto the political scene in 2015.
They’ve replaced humor to have the hosts spew the Democrat Party talking points of the day.
Leno returned to The Tonight Show in 2010 after O’Brien replaced him for only seven months.
He hosted the show until he retired for good in 2014.
That was the right time to walk away from late-night TV.
“When [David] Letterman and I were competing, it was a lot of fun. I enjoyed all of it,” Leno said. “And it’s a really hard job. I commend all the guys, the men and women doing it now. It’s just different now. In those days of appointment television, people turned on Letterman and I to see what we had to say about whatever the story was. Now you can just get it anytime without having to watch the show.”
“I think we got out just in time,” Leno added.
He admitted that he doesn’t watch late-night TV anymore.
“The reason I don’t is more to do with the commercials,” Leno explained. “It’s five minutes of show, five minutes of commercials, six minutes of show, eight minutes of commercials. When you can watch the entire ‘Godfather’ trilogy uninterrupted streaming at the same time.”
“If I see Jake from State Farm again, I’m gonna pull my hair out,” Leno joked. “They just run the same commercials over and over. I can’t stand it.”
Late-night TV has lost its cultural relevancy since Jay Leno and David Letterman went off the air.
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